aleatório Guide Article

Help! My Friend is Suicidal! Tips to Handling This Tough Situation.

Well shit. Actually no, I doubt you are actually here suddenly in a rush because you just encountered this situation a few minutos atrás and thought the best place was to check my club for whatever reason. If that is the case, please, you made a bad decision, call a suicide hotline, procurar a mais valid source, and focus on your friend and make sure they survive the situation. This artigo won't help you mais than anything there will especially since this is mais of a tip artigo from someone who has had a lot of experience with this.

So lets talk.

First thing we want to establish. Are they actively suicidal or passively suicidal? As in are they actively planning on killing themselves now or soon and/or have they come up with a plan to do so. If so, that is someone who is actively suicidal. If they are stating they want to die, they want to kill themselves, and similar lines but are not actually planning to and/or have yet to get to the point of planning it, then it is passively suicidal. The difference is important as one calls for mais immediate strict attention while the other one usually is best handled in a much mais softer manner, but still also is important and needs attention.

But first, lets talk about the passively suicidal type.

For this type, Im sure a lot of us have probably come across a part in our life where we had passive suicidal ideation and, in this case, most people can relate and understand it. For this, its not as complex of an explanation as there really isnt much you can do, but it is concerning as a friend to hear someone suffering like this, so here are a few things you can do that tends to help them.

1) Try to talk to them and let them know you are willing to listen. This is important. Many people who do this do not feel like saying this actually helps too much since there are no immediate results, but often people who are that depressed take solace in the fact that there is someone who at least seems to care, whether they like it or not. Also, this could possibly lead to them contacting you in the case passive becomes active which could lead to the possibility that you could possibly help them a lot. Make sure they know they are loved and cared for, if not por anyone else, por you.

2) DO NOT push them to talk, but DO keep an eye out for them. Often pushing for information or whats bothering them can simply make the situation worse and/or cause them to push you away. You want to seem like an opening and caring friend, not a mother or a therapist. However, while they may not want you prying, keep an eye out for really concerning signs that might be of someone actually planning to kill themselves or that their depression is getting significantly worse. In the case you see this, lightly and gently bring it up and see if they will talk or give you information, but again. Do. Not. Push.

3) Give tips / help if possible. However cliche lines can make things worse. Rather than talking specifically about the depression and how it will get better (since those tend to spawn cliche lines), try to talk about the causes of the depression if you can figure it out without pushing them mais than they are willing to share. Depression is often a side effect of another issue. Anxiety? Family issues? Jobs? Relationships?

4) Try to get them professional help if possible. You arent a professional, dont take up too much on your own. This one is one I took a while to learn myself. As good as you may be at this, you shouldnt take too much burden of someone’s issues on your own. It can easily become unhealthy for both you and them. If possible, suggest them to a professional if they can.

5) Relax and understand that their mental health is not something you can control. Again, as stated above, having a friend who is in a bad mental state is a stressful thing to have. Under all circumstances, try not to believe its your duty to fix it and do not take responsibility for it. You dont have control of it and its best just to relax. The last thing someone who is suicidal wants to see is that their suicidality is causing their friend trouble and the last thing you want is for yourself to break under the pressure and stress.

For the most part, that is all that I can really say about that type. Now the big one.

You came to your computer to see a text message or an email holding a wonderful suicide note from your friend and you are just in time to talk to them while they are in the process or going on to do it. Or perhaps you came início and walked in on it. If so, Im sorry for what you are going through right here and now. It will be a stressful seguinte few hours. Lets go through what seems to work the best from my experience.

1) Brace yourself. You must not start panicking. Panicking is one of the things you really do not want to do but also one of the hardest things to not do at the same time. If you freak out, it adds to the chaos that is already there so, as best as you can, stay calm and if you cant, bottle up and hide your panic. What is going to go down will likely be tiring, stressful, and emotional and what is most important is that you can stay calm and level to guide the situation in the right direction. Currently, your friend is likely nowhere in the right mind so to make this go as smoothly as possible, you have to be the one with the cool and calm head. Do not yell. Do not panic. Do not get mad at them.

2) If the act has already been done, call 911 immediately. If they have stomached a bottle of pills, slit one of their arms, etc already, before you do absolutely anything call 911 and get emergency people here immediately. If you cant since you dont know the address, repeatedly try to convince them to get the help themselves. If its the case of overdose, specifically a type of pills, get them to puke it out. While the pills may have been consumed, if you can get them to puke it out as fast as you can, they can probably make it out with only minor stomach damage.

3) If you are unsure of your ability to handle this, get try to get them to call the suicide hotline or call them yourself. Use your best judgement for this.

4) If you can not do #2 or #3 or are in the process of waiting for one of the two, keep them talking. If anything, keep them talking. The simple rule goes to say that if they are talking and texting, they arent dead or killing themselves. For the most part, even if people are at the point of planning to commit suicide even in the seguinte few minutos or days, they are likely still holding onto something if they sent something to you. In that case, talk to them and talk to them and talk to them like that is the only point to the world. If you can talk to them enough, you could possibly buy them time for them to calm down and back out of the idea even if its only for a few days and, if you are good at it, you might even find the core reason or the thing that pushed them to be in such a far state of wanting to die. If you can figure out specifically what triggered it, then you could possibly try to add a little bit of hope to the situation that caused it to get better and during a time like this, all they need is that bit of hope to just buy a few days.

5) If you can, I would suggest also letting someone close to them know, whether the suicidal person likes it or not. Unless you know the situation with their closest family and friends are bad, it is always good to let someone else who can watch over them closely know. If its the case that the suicidal person does not want you telling others, I would suggest telling them on the down low and mentioning to keep it a secret that they know so that the suicidal person doesnt feel betrayed, but they also have another person keeping an eye out for them.

But anyways, I think thats all I can think of right now off the topo, início of my head. If you have anymore tips you got from experience, you can add them as well.

Also, for those that don’t know, Ive gotten into both of these situations way mais often than Id like to admit.

6 comments

^Its true. Its mental health in general pretty much. Most effective for depression, suicide, and trauma from what Ive seen. Anxiety and other similar things sometimes tend to have other tips tho, but the same ones are applicable.